What are the exact limitations of TS4 game engine?

Recently, the developers have nerfed the in game textures of objects in the game to make the game easier to run and it is highly suspected that it is because the game is starting to struggle.

Lindsay talks about the engine somewhat in her Q&A with James Turner, however, It's important to keep in mind the background with how the game was created when it was "Project Olympus" and when there's mention of "what they could have done differently" and "adding flexibility" there was only so much they could do because of the limitations of the engine.
(source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKzjiiox0Fk)

Edit: Another great video in reference to "Project Olympus"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epxTbdLxc7o

They are also limited by their system requirements, I don't think they have ever said specifically the limitations they have to work with but gamechangers that have worked with them have mentioned things that they can't build lots that have too many objects and I can imagine this is also restricting them in how they are designing their worlds.

I'm not sure the engine can be upgraded or improved, the thing is that people that are running really good graphics cards are experiencing lag or performance issues, this hints that the engine can't use better hardware very effectively.

One thing that I have suspected recently is that the game is also very CPU heavy, if you don't have a good enough CPU you are going to experience simulation lag and even then, there are so many things that are running in the background now with so much DLC added to it.

The limitations seem to change, depending on the convenience it makes for EA... for example, in the beginning, the developers literally said pools would be "impossible" to add in the game due to the engine's incapability of processing it correctly, but after the huge inevitable backlash, they came to the conclusion of having no other choice but to actually start giving players what they want. In my opinion, it was just an excuse for their laziness and unwillingness to actually work on the game.

They also said the game engine was purposely designed to have the capability of running on lower end machines, but many people have been experiencing issues (even on high end machines)... what gives?

It's just funny how Sims 3's lag and bugs were constantly blamed on open world and create a style, which seemed like a reasonable excuse at the time, but since Sims 4 doesn't have either of those features, how do we explain the bugs and lag it has? lol It's just comical at this point. I think EA should just come out and be completely honest... they're just too incompetent to create a game that runs properly because they don't wanna put in the extra effort to optimize it correctly.

Though, to be fair, Sims 4 was originally intended to be a game made for tablets, but EA turned it into a PC game at last minute for bigger profit.

I think the engine has its limitations but most of the limitations come from their desire for the game to work on any computer. Sadly they've cut back on so many things so that the game works for players with potato computers from like 2011 that take 30 minutes to boot up and overheat the second anything happens. From what I understand their decision to do that is responsible for a lot more of the issues than the engine.

"Lustianicia;c-17826277" wrote:


It's just funny how Sims 3's lag and bugs were constantly blamed on open world and create a style, which seemed like a reasonable excuse at the time, but since Sims 4 doesn't have either of those features, how do we explain the bugs and lag it has? l

@Lustianicia The lag in the Sims 3 was not caused by open-world and Create a style. Sure these two features contributed to the lag but a big part was also because of poor coding, which if fixed makes the game a lot more playable hence why mods like Overwatch work so well.
The game just has a lot of routing errors and culling issues but has no in-built way to fix them once they keep happening over time.

The open world and create a style excuse was just used as damage control to defend the Sims 4 after the backlash and give a good reason why these features were left out, when in reality Maxis just didn't have enough time to make them (similarly to pools and toddlers) because they had to build a single-player game in an engine that was not meant for a single-player game.

But ever since they started spreading that excuse simmers keep spreading it without realizing that the developers never had to completely cut out these features to make the game work better, they simply had to optimize them (like what happened with the Sims 4 Cats and Dogs which came with a color wheel) but they were simply too lazy to optimize them so they decided to not even bother.

Who knows? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

If I remember correctly I think I remember the former executive producer herself claiming we wouldn't have pools and the like, due to the trade offs of all the new tech and features in the game. Which was obviously not true (figured it all come down to them having to rush a unfinished product out the door due to time constraints and whatever set backs.) Got the pools, toddlers and some of the other features that were missing from launch, so I I don't think this game is too heavily limited other than what can't be changed due to labor and time. (Game can't really be a vast open world obviously with how it was designed.)

Much like when I look at pets that are decked out with a color wheel and such for CAS since they had to be made from scratch, so they had the proper channels and the like to do it. Same could have been for S4 for clothing and hair if it was planned that way. I do feel like hair MIGHT end up having sliders much like the makeup and skin to push past more of those limitations that are there.

They said during snowy escape that the limitations are the number of objects and unique swatches including walls, floors, roofs, etc. It also seems to extend not just to the house you're playing but the whole neighborhood. A house with excessive lived-in clutter will perform less well than the same house sparsely decorated. They even said when wallpapering walls, don't leave any bare because that counts as a different wallpaper and adds to the resource usage. It's definitely something to consider if you're having performance issues - the house you're in and the other houses around it.

"tweedle;d-987741" wrote:

All of these issues are blamed on the game engine but never really explained in depth. I would also like to know if it's possible for TS4 game engine to be further upgraded.

Framework can be upgraded but it depends on the estimated time it would take to do so in hindsight. Also the game was built almost entirely with python and with version 2.7 I think. If they decide that the game would benefit from the newer features of the current python, they would have to upgrade a lot of stuff(python 2x is not compatible with python 3x) and at this stage the time required for that may not be feasible.

Most people don't know what they're talking about when they mention engine.

There is no such thing as a true limitation of an engine. Things that were not possible like pools, split foundation, terrain manipulation etc can all be added onto the engine.

The question is, is it worth the time and money to make the chance for that specific content?

Engines are constantly changed and updated.

The sims 4 engine could be changed for open world and cast if they wanted, but it would require SO much work and rewriting code that it wouldn't be worth it. I don't have a way of accurately describing how much time and money would need to go into redoing it.

This is why, instead of reusing codes, they typically start fresh with a new engine and a new sims game.

When people blame the engine, they really don't know what they're talking about. Yes, the engine was originally for olympus, but almost anything engine wise can be modified.

"Kerrigan;c-17826368" wrote:
They said during snowy escape that the limitations are the number of objects and unique swatches including walls, floors, roofs, etc. It also seems to extend not just to the house you're playing but the whole neighborhood. A house with excessive lived-in clutter will perform less well than the same house sparsely decorated. They even said when wallpapering walls, don't leave any bare because that counts as a different wallpaper and adds to the resource usage. It's definitely something to consider if you're having performance issues - the house you're in and the other houses around it.

That has nothing to do with the engine, that's so the game can run on low end machines because people with poor laptops buy the game, and legally, the game has to run on the minimum specs advertised.

"Lustianicia;c-17826277" wrote:
The limitations seem to change, depending on the convenience it makes for EA... for example, in the beginning, the developers literally said pools would be "impossible" to add in the game due to the engine's incapability of processing it correctly, but after the huge inevitable backlash, they came to the conclusion of having no other choice but to actually start giving players what they want. In my opinion, it was just an excuse for their laziness and unwillingness to actually work on the game.

They also said the game engine was purposely designed to have the capability of running on lower end machines, but many people have been experiencing issues (even on high end machines)... what gives?

It's just funny how Sims 3's lag and bugs were constantly blamed on open world and create a style, which seemed like a reasonable excuse at the time, but since Sims 4 doesn't have either of those features, how do we explain the bugs and lag it has? lol It's just comical at this point. I think EA should just come out and be completely honest... they're just too incompetent to create a game that runs properly because they don't wanna put in the extra effort to optimize it correctly.

Though, to be fair, Sims 4 was originally intended to be a game made for tablets, but EA turned it into a PC game at last minute for bigger profit.

Not to correct you, but they said it was not CURRENTLY possible, because it wasn't at the time, but they said they were looking into it. That's how engines work, they are constantly updated and modified to make new things possible.